POWER POP: My Old Kentucky Blog tempts you to download the Luxury Liners by name-dropping Badfinger, Big Star, The Byrds and The Raspberries. I wouldn't go that far, but you also can get the MP3s straight from the band's official website or stream some from the band's MySpace page. If I had to pick an original, it would be "Sunshine," but the cover of Cher's "Believe" is really good.

THE SPANISH INQUISITION: Amongst their weaponry are: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency and an almost fanatical devotion to Natalie Portman.

EVA LONGORIA has vexed her ABC bosses by taping a segment for Dateline NBC. The picture of Longoria bikini-clad to present an MTV award fails to show just how tight the bottom piece was. But no o­ne ever accused her of leaving anything to the imagination. Except maybe Dude.Man.Phat, who definitely has an imagination.

RUSSELL CROWE slams celebrity acitivists like Bono and Bob Geldof. According to Crowe, "There's a lot that can be achieved by putting a cheque in the right place and shutting up about it." I'm sure the hotel employee who got hit by the phone Crowe threw at him agrees 11 million times over.

GWYNETH PALTROW and CHRIS MARTIN are relocating to Los Angeles, if o­nly to prove that neither is physically capable of getting a tan.

RE-WILDING UPDATE: A plan by a Cornell University-led team of scientists to populate U.S. grasslands with wild lions, cheetahs, elephants and other African safari favorites -- previously noted here -- has been slammed by conservation groups.

DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES: Teri Hatcher gets a retraction of that story about her having fun in an old VW van in her yard, even as she denies rumors of an eating disorder. Eva Longoria is said to be suffereing headaches after being struck in the head by a pole o­n-set. I wonder if that falls under Workers' Comp?

IRAQ II: Agency France Presse reports that "General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, expressed concern about a 'growing gap' between the US public's downbeat perception of the war o­n Iraq and that of the troops fighting it... Unlike others in the US administration, Myers did not blame the media coverage for the gap. Instead, he acknowledged the difficulty of conveying progress in a counter-insurgency campaign in which there are no front lines." Though perhaps Myers might reconsider if he sees AFP refer to the "war on Iraq." Knight-Ridder's Tom Lasseter continues his series painting the situation in al Anbar as hopeless, much like London's Guardian. The examples of local residents providing cruical info that prompts an airstrike against 50 terrorists (possibly leaders, too) and local Sunnis fighting Al Qaeda supporters never seem to make it into these stories. Bill Roggio questions the Guardian story o­n the situation in Haiditha; the blog of a reporter in the area, while not entirely rosy, seems to contradict the idea that the insurgents are running the Haiditha dam. Nor does it appear as though Fallujah is falling into insurgent hands, as the Guardian suggests. The AP has a new FAQ page devoted to its Iraq coverage, probably in response to the complaints from its member papers noted here previously. My favorite part is where the AP claims that it "also writes frequently about reconstruction efforts -- outlining both the progress that has been made in renovating schools (in a story earlier this summer)..." "Frequently" = "earlier this summer?"

HOGS ROAR: Chattanooga city officials agreed to relax enforcement of a noise ordinance as about 12,000 Harley-Davidson bikers arrived Friday for a national convention along the city's typically tranquil riverfront... with millions of dollars to spend.

L.A. GATOR UPDATE: Reptile wranglers searching for the crafty Carlito in Lake Machado have given up the hunt — at least for now. Abraham Amezcua, 35, who was selling T-shirts reading "You'll Never Catch Me" in English and Spanish, said the gator may not be seen for a long time.

JACK WHITE MULLS COKE DEAL: The White Stripes' frontman has been in talks with Coca-Cola to pen a new song for their commercials. "They want a new 'I'd Like To Buy The World A Coke' and believe Jack is the o­nly artist who can deliver them something that will be equally timeless," a source told NME. Why not? The band and soda already share the same color scheme...

COVER SONGS: The Foxymorons are offering their album of covers -- which ranges from Hank Williams to Big Star to Gram Parsons to Whitney Houston -- for free and legal downloading, complete with cover art. The Copy, Right blog continues to kill music with a batch ranging from Kelis to Pete Townshend to Neil Diamond and Madonna.

THE KNITTERS get a nice write-up in L.A. City Beat. John Doe o­n recording the band's second record in 20 years: "We could’ve done it in under five hours, but you’ve got to take time out for bullsh*tting, telling jokes, and horsing around."

TALKIN' 'BOUT MY G-G-GENERATION: Most incoming college students were born in 1987, which is roughly when most Pate fans graduated college, give or take a few years. The Beloit College Mindset List tells you how their worldview differs from yours.

MARY-KATE OLSEN may become the new face of Calvin Klein. She may attract a younger demographic than Ashley, who was born two minutes earlier. No doubt her eating disorder was also considered a plus by the waif-friendly designer.

DENISE RICHARDS and CHARLIE SHEEN look more and more like they are reconciling.

ORLANDO BLOOM is a scatterbrain, which may explain his o­n-again relationship with Kate Bosworth.

JOHN CLEESE is having parts of his colon removed... and wants to auction them o­n his web site. I think he may run into some legal problems regarding medical waste disposal. But it's the thought that counts.

SPIDER CAUSES CAR WRECK: A German woman shocked by a spider crawling across her face lost control of her car and crashed head o­n into a roadside tree, according to police in the western town of Rheine. The car was totally destroyed but the woman and the spider escaped with o­nly slight injuries.

TWO SUSPECTS AND A PARAKEET were sought by police in the investigation of a robbery of a hardware store in Des Moines, IA. It turned out that Peetie was a small parrot and apparently was not charged in the case.

PET POLITICS is the nom de rock of Magnus Larsson, who tells *Sixeyes that some of his favorite records are by Bonnie "Prince" Billy, the Velvet Underground, Sonic Youth, Silver Jews, and Magnetic Fields. His stuff bears out those influences, with the exception of Sonic Youth. The interview also links to legal downloads for you listening pleasure.

PETE DOHERTY UPDATE: The troubled singer is supposedly back with galpal Kate Moss, so why is Moss moving to L.A., where she fled two months ago when she and Doherty briefly broke up.

EVA LONGORIA has said that she would not romance her fellow stars, because she feels that in Hollywood, everybody has slept with everybody. Wasn't Tommy Lee spotted stumbling out of her hotel room at 3:30 a.m. the other day?

SIX FEET UNDER: In the event that anyone who hasn't seen the finale who wants to, I won't spoil anything. But if you saw the end and want to know even more, check TV Squad.

HOLLYWOOD'S SUMMER SLUMP ha hardened into a stark reality: "overall movie attendance, a figure not affected by inflation, has slid to below where it stood in mid-August 2001. DVD sales, while still robust, are no longer rising exponentially, and some analysts say that a poor box office performance this summer will lead to poor DVD sales this winter. With billions of dollars at stake, nerves are growing understandably frayed."

JOAN BAEZ visited "Camp Victory" to interview Bush supporters in Crawford, TX. The Buzz blog at National Review o­nline reports: "To Ms. Baez’s credit, she was quite respectful and diplomatic when talking with the supporters, even though they have very different views o­n the war and President Bush." Marxist blogger Norm Geras invokes a peace anthem sung by Baez, with a twist. At MyDD (a nexus for the early supporters of Howard Dean's Presidential campaign), Chris Bowers is tired of Vietnam comparisons that he thinks are unhelpful to the antiwar cause.

EGYPTIAN BLOGGERS are leading antigovernment protests. The linked article also notes that Bahrain is another Middle Eastern country where bloggers have butted heads with the government in recent months, with calls for a new constitution, the separation of powers, and greater political liberties seemingly rattling the government.

OSAMA BIN LADEN reportedly injured in Afghanistan, fwiw. As the story is that he was wounded while taking part in an attack o­n a Spanish military base, I would guess it's not worth much; I don't see OBL as being a "hands o­n" manager at this point.

ASSASSINATION: Given the general uproar (myself included) over the Rev. Pat Robertson's comments, I note that all sorts of folks in the media -- from Thomas Friedman of The New York Times to Bill Kristol to George Stephanopolous -- advocated the assassination of Saddam Hussein. The case of Saddam may well be distinguishable from that of Hugo Chavez, but the general lack of uproar over those other comments (outside the pages of Mother Jones, natch) still makes for an interesting contrast. Perhaps MoJo's Eric Umansky had it right in noting that "The press, of course, has the distinct advantage that nobody really follows their policy suggestions anyway, so their advice doesn't have to be diplomatic, or even legal..."